Swift and Saddled (Rebel Blue Ranch, #2)

by Lyla Sage

I’ve come in contact with a lot of liars, but none quite so big as Google.

he flashed me a small smile that hinted at a dimple on either side of his face. Not fucking dimples. Those should be illegal. Or at least require some sort of warning before flashing them at people. Warning: Dimples may appear and cause panty-dropping.

“Sorry about him.” His voice was close to me now. My fluffy companion wagged his tail as his owner’s footsteps approached. “He’s got a thing for beautiful women.”

His other hand traveled from my hip to my ass, and he slid his hand into the back pocket of my jeans. “Is this okay?” he asked against my mouth.

In my head, he had been a cowboy because I was in Wyoming and he was wearing cowboy boots. It didn’t occur to me that he was actually a cowboy.

Wes had stopped hammering and brought his T-shirt up to his face to wipe away some sweat. Damn.

Derail my day? I’d drive my truck off a cliff if it meant that I got a few moments alone with her, but she didn’t need to know that.

Wes looked so happy. But I guess depression wasn’t really about what you looked like or how you appeared but more about what you felt like.

“I see you, Ada. I always see you, even when you won’t look at me.”

I liked her. Which was an all-consuming, daydreaming, slightly annoying way.

“I want to talk to you,” she said, still not looking at me. “New rule,” I replied. “You have to look at me when you talk to me.”

“I’ll teach you,” I said, trying not to make it obvious that I would’ve gotten down on my knees and begged her to let me.

“Are you”—I looked at him, knowing a smile was working its way up my cheeks—“quoting How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days?” A blush crept up Wes’s cheeks. “Yeah, I guess I am,” he said.

I thought back to that night at the bar, how he made me smile, and how he’d made me smile every day since—even when I wasn’t kind to him. He was like the sun. No matter what, he would keep coming up.

I employed a severe brand of “I’m not like other girls” and decided that disliking Taylor Swift, not wearing makeup, and listening to obscure indie bands would become my entire personality. All to distract from the fact that I actually wanted to be exactly like the other girls.

“Everything,” he said. “Everything changed the day Emmy came home, but I think, without really knowing it, both of us just started giving each other pieces of ourselves, and then we realized we wanted to keep them. Forever.”

Ada wasn’t just “on my mind,” she was in it—in every nook and cranny.

I felt his hand trail over my shoulder and move my hair to one side of my neck, and a shiver rocked my spine. Then I felt his lips on my shoulder. “Is this okay?” he murmured.

“You are earnest and talented, tenacious and funny.” I couldn’t have looked away from him if I’d tried. His green eyes gripped me and wouldn’t let go. “I would never insult you by calling you something as generic as nice.”

It wasn’t his words that got me—it was his eyes. From the first time he looked at me until now, I felt Weston Ryder saw me, no matter how hard I tried to hide.

“I don’t have to check yours anymore. You’re always following Ada around.”

“What am I smelling?” Teddy asked, looking around the kitchen. Once she saw Gus, she said, “Shit. That’s what I’m smelling.”

“Oh my god,” Teddy groaned. “You are literally so stupid. C’mon, Top Gun, let’s go shave off that mustache.” “Oh, fuck off,” Gus snapped.

Wes’s cheeks turned crimson, and all the butterflies in my stomach erupted from their cocoons.

Blushing Wes was my favorite Wes.

A cowboy, with his white shirt clinging to his body, his brown cowboy hat, and a calf in his arms that he’d just rescued from a storm? Damn. Damn.

“Because someone needs to take care of you now.”

“Weston I-don’t-know-your-middle-name Ryder. Take off your goddamn shirt. Now.”

“My middle name is Rhodes,” he said. Weston Rhodes Ryder.

This man was on his knees and looking up at me like I was the most precious thing in the world.

“You’re beautiful,” he said, then kissed each of my hip bones and got to his feet.

“Can I touch you now? Please, god, let me touch you.”

“Ada,” he said as he slowly worked himself in, “I think you were made for me.”

I was halfway in love with Ada Hart, and I had no clue what to do about it. I’d known it for a while, but today I passed the point of no return.

Gus: What is she even doing in this message thread. *Teddy Andersen has removed Gus Ryder from the chat*

Gus: I’m sure he’s fine. Wes, tell our baby sister your fine. Teddy: *you’re* Gus: WHY ARE YOU IN HERE

I gave her waist a squeeze, and she giggled. Ada wasn’t a giggly woman, but she giggled for me, and it made me feel like I could run through a wall. In a good way.

“This is perfect.” So are you, I thought.

“Are you seriously shirtless and bottle-feeding a baby cow right now?”

Ada laid her head on my shoulder. She didn’t say anything—she didn’t have to. For years, I had desperately wanted someone to just…be…with me. To sit next to me while the power was out and weather the storm together.

It wasn’t that I grew up feeling like I didn’t belong, but like I didn’t belong where I was but might belong elsewhere.

Maybe I could belong here. With Wes. And Emmy, and Teddy, and Cam. With Amos too.

Weston Ryder was the most beautiful man I’d ever known—inside and out.

“God, you’re pretty,” he said. He leaned in and kissed my neck.

At his core, Weston Ryder was gentle, and I thought that was the best thing that a man could be.

“What do you want to know?” “You,” he said simply.

Wes was smiling so wide that his cheeks had to hurt. “Ada Hart,” he said earnestly, “you would’ve made one hell of a Price Is Right model.”

“Hey, sweetheart,” I said in greeting. “Hi, cowboy.”

“Luke Brooks is without a doubt the love of my life, but my soulmate has always been Teddy Andersen.”

At this point, I was pretty sure I’d been waiting for her my whole life, so an hour was easy.